Splitting ironman into two options

[fizzix]

I'm going to change the birth options on my personal copy to create a challenge option that I want to play. I guess the question is whether people want this in Vanilla also. I'd be happy to pull request it into V if desired. I've described this before, but I plan to start working on this tonight.

Ironman gets split into two separate options. birth_no_recall and birth_force_descend.

birth_no_recall makes wands and rods of recall do nothing. It has no other effect on gameplay.

birth_force_descend causes upstairs to not function and downstairs to always drop you to max_depth + 1. This includes the downstairs in town. Recall will still function almost as normal and will bring you to level 0, or max_depth+1 if you are already in town. Teleport level and monsters teleporting you will always move you down unless you are on a quest level or the level below in which case they will not work. (maybe self-cast scrolls and spells should work, but enemy spells should not?)

Recall will not work on quest levels if the quest monster has not been killed.

You will be prompted before descending to dlevel 99 and again before descending to dlevel 100 because you will not be able to recall from those levels.

birth_no_stores gets removed entirely, it essentially gets replaced with birth_forced_descend. The reason for removing this option is that it adds no changes to game functionality that can't be obtained by just choosing not to enter a store.

I will ensure that setting both options recreates current "ironman" gameplay exactly.

[Derakon]

So the real change is that now we can play games where you have access to the town but can't repeat levels (IOW more lenient ironman), or where you can pretend that you don't know what Word of Recall does.

I don't know...the birth_no_recall option seems underwhelming. I mean, I played that way (without forced descent) as a kid before I figured out what the "the air around you fills with static" message actually meant (I assumed that the recall effect was just a trap I hadn't noticed) and it basically was just tedious.

I like the new semi-ironman option that opens up via birth_force_descend but not birth_no_recall; I just wish that birth_no_recall but not birth_force_descend was a sensible option on its own, too.

[Mikko Lehtinen]

Vanilla with birth_force_descend sounds interesting.

How do you think you will play it personally? Will you descend as aggressively as in standard Vanilla, clearing only parts of each level?

[fizzix]

@Derakon: I agree that birth_no_recall is a bit boring on its own. But I see the advantage of having both birth_no_recall and birth_forced_descend set. So basically there are 3 interesting options with 2 binary switches instead of 4. Meh, I can live with that.

@Mikko: I have no idea, but I want to find out. This is the game I want to play. Ironman with the added inventory options of the house.

[emulord]

Scroll of Home access anyone? :3

[Magnate]

Ummm .... isn't birth_no_stores already gone? I can't see it in birth options in current V. I think it was removed to make way for no_selling.

This creates a problem because we're limited to 16 birth options unless you fancy rewriting the options code. I guess you could replace birth_ai_smart with your extra option, since nobody's going to "fix" that any time soon.

I agree with Derakon that no_recall is not a good option in its own right. I think it'd be better to remove ironman from binary birth options altogether and put it as a "Set difficulty level" in the top-level options menu, after "Set movement delay". Then you could have three difficulty levels: normal, force_descend (with recall) and ironman.

[fizzix]

Ummm .... isn't birth_no_stores already gone? I can't see it in birth options in current V. I think it was removed to make way for no_selling.

This creates a problem because we're limited to 16 birth options unless you fancy rewriting the options code. I guess you could replace birth_ai_smart with your extra option, since nobody's going to "fix" that any time soon.

I agree with Derakon that no_recall is not a good option in its own right. I think it'd be better to remove ironman from binary birth options altogether and put it as a "Set difficulty level" in the top-level options menu, after "Set movement delay". Then you could have three difficulty levels: normal, force_descend (with recall) and ironman.

ah, it was removed for the "halve view option" I guess then I'll replace birth_ai_smart.

I don't feel like messing with the trinary option right now. My goal is to get it working so I can play as soon as fizzlebert wins or dies.

[Estie]

Excellent. Have been hoping for this for a long time.

[PowerWyrm]

Recall will not work on quest levels if the quest monster has not been killed.

This would mean that an accidental *destruction* on such level would screw the char if force_down is also used...

[fizzix]

This would mean that an accidental *destruction* on such level would screw the char if force_down is also used...

That's already the current situation for ironman.

You have to wait until sauron/morgoth respawns.

[fizzix]

I think I finally took care of all the edge cases I could think of and things should work. (I've pushed a forced_descent branch to github at https://github.com/fizzix/angband )

The game prompts you before you descend or recall to a quest level, and let's you cancel at the expense of the recall scroll. You can not recall from a quest level. Deep descent can still deposit you on a quest level, I just didn't feel like messing with it, especially since that's not an effect that can happen without the player's knowledge.

There's still a chance that I missed something, so no promises that things will work.

If people are interested, I'll put up a windows executable with the changes that I'll be using when I get around to the next youtube game. They are the following:

forced-descent option
Spell-casting monsters get additional spell-book drops
smaller group size (I'm thinking 12-15 instead of the current 32)
spawned monsters start asleep (haven't done this yet)
detect enchantment becomes mass_identify spell. rods of identify will have the same effect (haven't done this yet, and not sure this will be ready.)

Note: I'm not proposing the addition of anything but the first two into V, the rest are things that I want.